What are the current views on last and corresponding authorship in ecology?

Analysis of data from Dynamic Ecology poll regarding authorship practices in ecology

Introduction

Who is the last author on a paper? Is it the person who did the least work? Or is it the PI of the lab where the work was done? When I started grad school (in 2000), the norm in ecology was still that the last author on a paper is the person who did the least work. But, more recently, it has seemed to me that the norm is that the last author on a paper is the “senior” author (usually the PI). However, if you talk with other ecologists about the topic, it’s clear that there’s variation in views, and that not everyone is on the same page.

{add more here on literature and what others have done on similar topics – see Evernote file for more on that}

Thinking about this topic as we were settling on authorship order for a manuscript recently led me to post a series of tweets where I mused about authorship practices in ecology which then led me to do a poll on Dynamic Ecology related to the topic. The poll was developed with input from Alex Bond, Linda Campbell, Kathy Cottingham, and Andrea Kirkwood, who all helped me think through what to ask about and how to phrase the questions and answer options. Many thanks to them for their help! And, while I’m doing acknowledgments, Auriel Fournier, Jaime Ashander, and Rayna Harris provided R help that got me over some key hurdles. Finally, this poll was confirmed as exempt from ongoing IRB review (UMich IRB #: HUM00114140).

The poll

The poll had four main questions:

  1. For ecology papers, do you consider the last author to be the senior author?
  2. Which of the following statements most closely matches the current norms in ecology in terms of who is corresponding author?
  3. Which of the following statements would be best practice in terms of who is corresponding author?
  4. If someone includes a statement on his/her CV indicating they have used a first/last author emphasis, do you pay attention to that?

It also asked about the respondent’s primary research area, whether their research is primarily basic or applied, how frequently they conduct interdisciplinary research, how many years post-PhD they are, where they live, and what their current department is.

The poll first appeared on 6 April 2016 and ran for two weeks.

Data manipulation

Four blank entries were deleted. I am a bad person and used excel to add in numeric codes for the different answers. The key is:

For the question about whether last author is the senior author:

1 = No  
2 = It depends, but probably no  
3 = Not sure, but probably no  
4 = Not sure, but probably yes  
5 = It depends, but probably yes  
6 = Yes

For the question about current corresponding author practices:

1 = The corresponding author is the person that has taken responsibility for fielding questions about the paper post-publication  
2 = The corresponding author is the person with the most stable contact info and/or internet access  
3 = The corresponding author is usually the person who uploaded the files (usually the first author)  
4 = The corresponding author is usually the senior author  
5 = The corresponding author uploaded the files, managed the revisions and wrote the response to reviewers, and took responsibility for the paper after publication

For the question about best corresponding author practices:

1 = The corresponding author should be the person that has taken responsibility for fielding questions about the paper post-publication  
2 = The corresponding author should be the person with the most stable contact info and/or internet access  
3 = The corresponding author should be whichever person uploaded the files (usually the first author)
4 = The corresponding author should be the senior author  
5 = The corresponding author should be the person who uploaded the files, managed the revisions and wrote the response to reviewers, and took responsibility for the paper after publication

For the question about the CV statement:

1 = No  
2 = I have never seen this, but would probably not pay attention to it  
3 = I have never seen this, but would probably pay attention to it  
4 = Yes

For the question about research area:

1 = Ecology (primarily field-based)  
2 = Ecology (primarily wet-lab based, including molecular ecology)  
3 = Ecology (primarily computational-based)  
4 = Evolutionary biology (primarily molecular)  
5 = Evolutionary biology (primarily organismal)  
6 = Biology other than EEB  
7 = Outside biology

For the basic vs. applied question:

1 = basic  
2 = applied

For the interdisciplinarity question:

1 = Never  
2 = Rarely  
3 = Sometimes  
4 = Often  
5 = Always

Years since PhD

1 = 0 (current students and people without a PhD should choose this)  
2 = 1-5  
3 = 6-10  
4 = 11-15  
5 = 16-20  
6 = >20  
7 = I do not have a PhD and am not a current student

Where live?

1 = Africa  
2 = Asia  
3 = Australia  
4 = Europe  
5 = North America  
6 = South America

Department:

1 = An EEB department (or similar)  
2 = A biology department  
3 = A natural resources department (or similar)  
4 = other

Basic overview of responses

After removing the four blank responses, there were 1122 responses to the poll. What did the respondents look like?

Primary Research Area of Respondents
PrimaryResearch n rel.freq
Biology other than EEB 24 2
Ecology (primarily computational-based) 217 19
Ecology (primarily field-based) 558 50
Ecology (primarily wet-lab based, including molecular ecology) 119 11
Evolutionary biology (primarily molecular) 51 5
Evolutionary biology (primarily organismal) 130 12
Outside biology 21 2
BasicApplied n rel.freq
Applied 362 33
Basic 751 67
Interdisciplinary n rel.freq
Always 50 4
Often 271 24
Sometimes 401 36
Rarely 293 26
Never 99 9
YearssincePhD n rel.freq
0 (current students should choose this) 311 28
5-Jan 344 31
10-Jun 200 18
15-Nov 136 12
16-20 57 5
>20 53 5
I do not have a PhD and am not a current student 20 2
WhereLive n rel.freq
Africa 8 1
Asia 13 1
Australia 63 6
Europe 288 26
North America 717 64
South America 30 3
Dept01 n rel.freq
1 304 28
2 444 41
3 212 19
4 134 12

Results for the four main questions

Q1: “For ecology papers, do you consider the last author to be the senior author?”

## # A tibble: 6 × 3
##   LastSenior01     n rel.freq
##          <int> <int>    <dbl>
## 1            1    77        7
## 2            2    61        5
## 3            3    19        2
## 4            4    88        8
## 5            5   395       35
## 6            6   480       43
## [1] 1 2 3 4 5 6
## Levels: 1 2 3 4 5 6

Q2: “Which of the following statements most closely matches the current norms in ecology in terms of who is corresponding author?”

## # A tibble: 5 × 3
##   CorrespondingCurrent01     n rel.freq
##                    <int> <int>    <dbl>
## 1                      1   182       16
## 2                      2    37        3
## 3                      3   215       19
## 4                      4    82        7
## 5                      5   602       54

Q3: “Which of the following statements would be best practice in terms of who is corresponding author?”

## # A tibble: 5 × 3
##   CorrespondingBest01     n rel.freq
##                 <int> <int>    <dbl>
## 1                   1   266       24
## 2                   2    40        4
## 3                   3    84        8
## 4                   4    46        4
## 5                   5   676       61

Q4: “If someone includes a statement on his/her CV indicating they have used a first/last author emphasis, do you pay attention to that?”

## # A tibble: 4 × 3
##   CVStatement01     n rel.freq
##           <int> <int>    <dbl>
## 1             1    87        8
## 2             2   234       21
## 3             3   538       49
## 4             4   245       22

Looking at cross-tabs

Does whether people view the last author as the senior author vary based on age, country, research area, and/or department?

## The following `from` values were not present in `x`: Biology other than EEB, Ecology (primarily computational-based), Ecology (primarily field-based), Ecology (primarily wet-lab based, including molecular ecology), Evolutionary biology (primarily molecular), Evolutionary biology (primarily organismal), Outside biology
## Scale for 'y' is already present. Adding another scale for 'y', which
## will replace the existing scale.

## Scale for 'y' is already present. Adding another scale for 'y', which
## will replace the existing scale.
## Scale for 'y' is already present. Adding another scale for 'y', which
## will replace the existing scale.
## Scale for 'y' is already present. Adding another scale for 'y', which
## will replace the existing scale.
## Scale for 'y' is already present. Adding another scale for 'y', which
## will replace the existing scale.
## Scale for 'y' is already present. Adding another scale for 'y', which
## will replace the existing scale.

Does whether people pay attention to a CV statement vary based on age, country, research area, department and/or their views on last authorship?

## [1] "Biology other than EEB"                                        
## [2] "Ecology (primarily computational-based)"                       
## [3] "Ecology (primarily field-based)"                               
## [4] "Ecology (primarily wet-lab based, including molecular ecology)"
## [5] "Evolutionary biology (primarily molecular)"                    
## [6] "Evolutionary biology (primarily organismal)"                   
## [7] "Outside biology"

Do views on corresponding authorship vary based on age, country, research area, and/or department?

## Warning in bind_rows_(x, .id): Unequal factor levels: coercing to character

Analysis of data on papers in Ecology 1956-2016

## 'data.frame':    496 obs. of  10 variables:
##  $ Journal       : Factor w/ 4 levels "AmNat","Ecology",..: 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 ...
##  $ Year          : int  1956 1956 1956 1956 1956 1956 1956 1956 1956 1956 ...
##  $ Volume        : int  1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 ...
##  $ Article.type  : Factor w/ 13 levels "article","brevia",..: 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 ...
##  $ First.page    : Factor w/ 276 levels "1","10","100",..: 1 246 102 148 180 204 227 238 242 248 ...
##  $ Author.names  : Factor w/ 273 levels "","\xf8kland & Bj\xc0rnstad",..: 215 93 33 171 246 119 182 27 74 221 ...
##  $ Number.authors: int  1 1 1 2 1 2 1 1 3 1 ...
##  $ Corresponding : Factor w/ 13 levels "1","2","20","3",..: 12 12 12 12 12 12 12 12 12 12 ...
##  $ Notes         : Factor w/ 35 levels "","all authors have email addresses, but specifies that first author is corresponding author",..: NA NA NA NA NA 20 NA NA 29 NA ...
##  $ Correspondence: Factor w/ 6 levels "all","first",..: 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 ...
## Warning in bind_rows_(x, .id): Unequal factor levels: coercing to character

## Warning in bind_rows_(x, .id): Unequal factor levels: coercing to character

## Warning in bind_rows_(x, .id): Unequal factor levels: coercing to character

## Warning in bind_rows_(x, .id): Unequal factor levels: coercing to character
## Warning in bind_rows_(x, .id): Unequal factor levels: coercing to character